Saying Goodbye
by TheLadyRunningDownToTheRiptide
Summary: After her banishment, Carol thinks about her life. She thinks about how the big parts of her life started and where it took her in the end. About the woman she use to be. She makes a decision and goes back to do something that she felt she should've done a long time ago. One shot, please review! They make me happy! :)


Hey! (This is optional read) Thanks for clicking on my one-shot! Now, I know that the chances of this happening are practically non existent, but lets pretend! I really love Carol (Favorite character) and I keep having this HORRIBLE feeling she's about to die, so I wanted to write her! This was originally going to be very short and just about her visit at the end, but I got carried away...

ENJOY!

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Carol Peletier was once a very hopeful woman. Always thought there was a light at the end of the tunnel. When she was little she would wear princess dresses and act the damsel in distress. When she was a teenager she would daydream about the man she would eventually marry. She pictured him with very dark hair, and soft blue eyes. Muscular and manly, like the celebrity's. When she was in collage, she met that someone, just not as good looking as she thought he'd be.

Ed Peletier was a sweet, handsome man back then. He'd compliment her almost everyday and whisper sugar coated words into her ears while they were in the dark. While he was entwining his fingers into her long, curly, auburn hair. Legs tangled together and bed covers messily draped over their naked bodies as he buried his face into the crook of her neck, leaving light kisses on her skin.

He may have acted differently if he had known that their long night together would've resulted in a child.

At first, Ed worked hard to try and earn money to help his girlfriend and unborn baby. They appealed to their parents for help, and only agreed to help if the two of them got married. Which they did. At the time, it had been a good idea. They thought they were in love and that their lives together would be paradise. And it could've been, but when things got hard and Carol was to stressed out with the pregnancy to help him, Edi turned to alcohol. By the time little Sophia was born, Ed had gained a beer belly, was almost never sober, and would begin to lash out on unexpected times.

The abuse didn't start until Sophia had been three.

It came so suddenly to Carol. She knew she was losing hold of her husband, and it was scary for her. She didn't want her daughter to live in such an environment. She asked him to go to rehab, to stop his addiction. An addiction he insisted he didn't have. He tried to storm out of the house, to stop having the conversation with his wife. But when she grabbed him before he could walk out the door, something happened. He could only see read and a small burst of anger run through his blood before he did the unthinkable:

He slapped his wife.

Carol decided to ignore that one time, to pretend she was comfortable around him. Then it happened again. And she did the same thing. Convincing herself that this was under control and she wasn't afraid of him. That a little girl needed her daddy and mommy together. When it started, she felt like she needed to feel pretty. She needed to be like normal woman. She'd make sure her curls were extra bouncy and that her red blouse was loose and unbuttoned at the top. Ed might've liked it, and the color red did always look nice on her. At first, her husband did like the way her clothes made the curvy parts of her figure pop out.

Unfortunately, so did other men.

He'd catch them sometimes. The looks she'd get while they were grocery shopping or strolling through the mall. Their lingering eyes checking her out, hoping to see a sight of her wherever they could. She'd see too sometimes, but pretend not to. Eventually, Ed decided that needed to go too. By the time Sophia was five, her mother had nearly no hair and wore baggy clothes that were carful to over up her cleavage and other womanly figures.

This is when Sophia started remembering things.

Year after year, she remembered everything. The one time her mother ended up having to go to the ER becomes she "Fell down the stairs" causing two broken ribs. In reality, she had accidently knocked the coffee pot off the counter and couldn't clean the glass up before her husband got home. She also remembered the time her mom "Slipped in the bathtub" resulting in a broken nose. The truth; He found out a friend of Carols was over earlier that day, and he didn't like that, thought she was sneaking around his back and was telling people about what he was doing to her. So he pushed Carol to the floor.

She remembered hearing the screaming match that would occur before these events happened. Hearing the punches land and Carols pleas for him to stop. Shaking with fright in her bed, not sure if she should stay in her dark room where it was seemingly safe, or go out there and try and help her momma. She tried the latter many times. Of course, they always ended up with her getting slapped. Luckily, that was always the worse that happened to her. Sophia always stuck up for her mother, determined to make sure she got out of any situation unharmed.

That's why she was happy when her daddy died.

After that day, she thought that maybe there was a chance she and her mom could be happy together. Carol thought that too. After Ed was gone, she would go through the clothes in the boxes they found and thought about how pretty she use to look in red. Maybe she still looked pretty in red. Maybe she could give Sophia a normal childhood. Well, as normal as you can get in a zombie apocalypse anyway. She could be Carol again instead of Ed's wife.

But then Sophia left.

After searching for days and days and days, they had found her. They had founder her as on of those walkers-as one of those things- and she was gone. A bite wound seen on the shoulder, a couple hours alone in the forest, and she was gone. She couldn't attend the funeral. She just couldn't. She had brought this on herself. She should've been a better mother and made sure Sophia was somewhere safe. Besides, was it really Sophia? Or was Sophia long gone? was Sophia sad when Carol didn't go to her funeral? That was something Carol didn't know. But, what she did know was she never got to say goodbye or apologize to her daughter. To tell her she was sorry for being such a coward and staying with Ed when she needed her.

That's why she was doing what she was now.

Her car was parked in front of the old house, waiting for her whenever she would be in need of it. The barn was long gone, burnt to the ground. She could swear that the smell of firing wood still lingered in the air and the sound of the flames crackling and popping in the distance was still there as well. She fiddled with the white flower in her palms with her fingers as she took shaky steps closer to where she was going. Her heart beat was louder then it ever had been before.

It seemed like forever before she approached the unmarked grave.

She just stared at the wooden cross sticking up from the ground for a minute. Just staring. Not thinking of anything. Not of the way it was a bit crooked, suggesting that a walker may have stumbled on it once or twice, or of the last time she had been there, or even of the person underneath. But the next minute, it hit her like a pile of bricks. She blinked her eyes a few times, making sure they weren't watering or anything.

"Hi Sophia," She finally spoke even though her throat was dry and her voice came out as little more then a whisper, "it's your momma."

She just kept silent again, as if waiting for a response to come from the grave. Of course, one didn't come.

"I... I really miss you," she continued to fill the air with her word, but no longer looked at her grave. Instead, her orbs were glued on her hand, "I know I wasn't there for you when you died, and I'm honestly not to sure why I came back, but here I am."

she was slightly uncomfortable. This felt like expressing herself and her emotions. Something she hadn't been use to for a very long time. Her small talks with Daryl were probably the closest she had gotten for years. To be open again, even if it was to the dead, felt... odd. She poked around her head for conversation topics, trying to think of something that might've caught Sophia's attention had she still been alive.

"I've met other kids," She says finally, thinking about the ones she had indeed met, "There are two certain ones that I take care off. Both girls. The oldest one is named Lizzie and her little sister is Mika. I started taking care of them after their father passed away. There are others too. Carl's still alright, by the way."

The woman babbled on about the things that seemed unimportant. The things that were straight up facts. She sighed, finally able to pry her eyes away from her wrinkled, worn out hands and at the grave. She knew what she had come here to do. She knew what she simply _had_ to do. Her face started to scrunch up a bit when emotion threatened to curve the edges of her face and water to drip out of her eyes. She took a deep breath, one that had shakily left. She just had to do what she had to.

"Im sorry," Her voice cracked a bit as the first of her tears began to fall down her cheek, "I know... I know what I've done. And I'm sorry. When you were gone, the woman I was then, she's gone too. I was too weak to come out here to your funeral, or to protect you when you needed me, or... I'm sorry. You could've had better. You didn't deserve this."

She choked on a soft sob

"I'm different now. I've killed people. I don't think you'd like the things I've done. The things I did simply to stay alive. It's been hard," She confessed to the deceased while wiping her cheek, "I've left people to die, I killed two, I've been banished from the group, and I fear that it wont be the worse thing that will ever happen. Not in this world it isn't. It hurts, but the thing that hurt most has... been losing you. And I know you deserved better... and I'm so sorry."

Her few tears soon turned into a stream. She didn't know what else to say. She hardly knew why she came. She held a hand up to her mouth and just let the tears slip out. It felt weird. After robbing herself of grief for months and months, to feel it all seep into her chest was heart crushing. She wordlessly bent down and placed the white Cherokee Rose down.

Carol Peletier was once a very hopeful woman, but the sad thing was that her hope was gone. The sad truth was; there would never be a light at the end of her tunnel.

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Poor Carol :(

Please leave a review if you enjoyed! Maybe favorite too? I would really appreciate it! If you Felt that Carol was a little OOC, PLEASE tell me! If you have any CONSTRUCTIVE criticism please leave that as well! I always am looking to improve my writing! Hope ypou liked it!

BATMAN (Yes, I am Batman) OUT ;)


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